


We Live Half in the Daytime

by lukrezius



Category: The Man From U.N.C.L.E. (2015)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Demons, Alternate Universe - Fantasy, Alternate Universe - Supernatural Elements, Alternate Universe - Vampire, Demon AU, M/M, Supernatural AU - Freeform, pls read this its taken me like 5 days lmao, this is not a supernatural (tv show) au ok??
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-05-24
Updated: 2016-05-24
Packaged: 2018-06-10 12:34:18
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,740
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6956638
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lukrezius/pseuds/lukrezius
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>You are eternal, thousands of years stretching both behind and in front of you. You are indestructible, ancient, all powerful. // You know you will eventually meet others like you, those who have been hunted by humans, killed mercilessly unless they have a use for you.</p><p>(Demon/vampire/magic au, canon era)</p>
            </blockquote>





	We Live Half in the Daytime

**Author's Note:**

> Title from VCR by the XX. This is all in second person (you/your) and I haven't used many speechmarks. I think this style works quite well, and I'm really enjoying showing more thoughts and memories.  
> It also alternates POV, starting with Illya, then Napoleon, then Illya again and so on.

You are shown drawings of a beautiful young man, the crisp pencil lines that made up his face showing the rigidity of iron-strong bones beneath the deceptively flawless, breakable looking exterior. There is a colour likeness of him too, a print of a painting done by some European master long ago. The resemblance is uncanny, despite the extreme difference in clothing, and you can see the same man in both, dressed in Renaissance splendour and in sleek modern American fashion. It is not only the sharp planes of his face that are identical, you see the same calculating, aged look in his eyes, completely at odds with his youthful appearance. What is he? you ask.

упырь, you are told. Vampire.

It is not unexpected. You know you will eventually meet others like you, those who have been hunted by humans, killed mercilessly unless they have a use for you. You are useful. You are useful. You are useful.

\---

You are eternal, thousands of years stretching both behind and in front of you. You are indestructible, ancient, all powerful. You are also careless. The CIA finds a weakness in you. You are tricked into a bond with them, a union forged after the bombing of a harbour and a petty war between the fleeting lives of humans. Ten years pass. You are invaluable to them, a spy who cannot be struck down by blade or bullet, a spy that doesn't sleep or eat, that doesn't appear in mirrors or shadows or photograph. Qualities that you have used to your advantage as a thief. They know about it, of course they do. But there is nothing they can do to stop you, you will not be fooled again by mere mortals.

Then, they assign you to a case, one that piques your interest for the first time in years. Another inhuman. Someone, or something, like you. A vampire? you ask

A fire-spirit, they say. A breed of monster native to the wild plains of eastern countries, now spread around the globe as blacksmiths and pyrotechnics and engineers.

She is, like you expected, fiery, in personality and in person. Her skin glows, like your own, but with a warmth that is foreign to you. She is reluctant to reveal herself, at first, tamping down the steady radiance from her skin. You show her your fangs, your pulseless wrist, and she stands, relaxing, allowing herself to shine like a candle in the gloom. 

You are chased, then, by a giant being as monstrous as yourself. You see horns, maybe, and a whipping tail in the half-light of this German street. Gaby is unafraid, and you feel, for the first time in this century, that you are not alone in the world. However, is being alone meant that you would not be being chased by a giant thirsting for your blood, you would take solitude any day.

\--

In person, he is cruel looking, the harsh cut of his jaw emphasized by the shadows. He makes it over the wall, the little furnace clinging to his frame as he glided down an invisible wire to the waiting vehicle.

You are stranded in the minefield between East and West, and you draw upon the last of your energy reserves to vanish in a wisp of black, appearing moments later in an office block occupied by Russian intelligence agents. Oleg finds you as you stumble to a chair, strands of darkness still clinging to your clothes. You slide into a sleep filled with glowing women and flat blue eyes.

You see him again, of course, and you feel his ice cold skin as you smash your fists into him. He is light, far lighter than anyone of his size could be, yet pulls himself to his feet when you get off him, perfectly fine despite having been thrown around like a rag doll. He throws you a smile, the white of his teeth catching the meagre light of the public bathrooms. You feel a strange rush of energy, a desire to break him, to see if your own monstrous strength could kill him. You want to find a way to marr his flawless skin.

You are assigned together, and you can smell his wariness beneath his confident facade at the prospect of being left alone with you. Your horns are hidden beneath a cap, and your tail is trapped down one leg of your trousers, yet he knows what you are. 

"Obviously, I was briefed about you", you say, "your corrupt background, your centuries of undetected crime. Moving from country to country, in the garden parties and throne rooms and studios of the greatest men and women to live. You like to live through the living, don't you?" He doesn't appear affected by your knowledge. He smiles, again, and your curl your hands to fists.

"I was not briefed about you," he replies, and his voice is American, more so than you'd anticipated. His long vowels and curling words do not match his angular face. "However, I thought I should read up on you. Rather a sad story, really, what with your father being a good pal of Stalin's, and a top government official, right up until he was caught harbouring angels. Tell me, was it when he was sent to the gulag that your horns started to grow? Oh, how your mother must have felt, brought down so low by angels, then let down by her son, a devil."

You stand, and grab the edge of the table, throwing it aside. He slides his coffee off before the table is ripped from under it, and holds your gaze as you tower over him.

\--

You admire him, in some small twisted way, his emotionless expressions and purposeful movements. You fear him, possibly, as you've spent your entire lifetime around harmless humans, and there is the possibility he could kill you as no human could. Vampires and ifrits and the rest, they were of earth, at least, despite being immortal. Devils, as well as angels, were something else. No one quite knew their origins, especially as no one had ever really researched the history of such isolated, secluded creatures. You know groups of vampires, some of them families or clans of newborns protected by their sire. Most creatures are pack animals, you have found, a choice which doesn't appeal to you. Devils, however, are almost always solitary, often raised by humans to maturity after being found, a crying replica of a human child, at the scene of a crime or execution. Many are chased away or attacked when their horns start to grow, something that has furthered, in many cases, the mistrust of humans.

You don't know the extent of his abilities.

Gaby dislikes her role in their mission. I would not be wife to that, she says. It is impossible, he is not like us. He is no more of an outcast than we are, you remind her. She is beautiful, her dark hair and eyes shining, her golden skin glowing. People will see you, he tells her, people will be watching you two. People like you look at beautiful things. Be careful of how you present yourselves.

You think I'm beautiful? she asks, not at all demure. You smile out of the corner of your eye at her.

\--

Your father's watch gets taken, and the little fire-sprirt- Gaby, you must remember her name- holds your clenched fists to stop you from lunging for them. Come on, darling, she says, her dark orange eyes staring into your own. Come on. 

You scowl, but let yourself be led away. The sense of loss is unfamiliar to you, as you realise there are very few things you own that you care about.

\--

You resort to skulking in the shadows as Gaby and her pretend husband enjoy the Italian sunshine. You don't let yourselves be seen together in public, anyway, as staying undercover is vital. You wear large sunglasses, to protect your nocturnal eyes from what you can, but you find yourself drained anyway, by the heat and light. You find him watching you, with curiosity, perhaps, at how resilient you are to sunlight, and you find yourself watching him too, at how surprisingly gentle he is with Gaby, how he watches birds in flight when he thinks no-one is looking. 

He constantly touches the cap covering his horns, unconsciously checking that he is still safe. When he smiles, some small part of you warms.

\--

She drinks, and dances and fights later, in your hotel room. She is charming, really, you think, watching her spin coils of fire around her knuckles. She glows, you realize, a hot red light from within when she isn't concentrating on suppressing it. What do you think of him? she asks you.

You lift your head to meet her eyes. The vampire?

Who else? she replies. You think, trying to formulate your emotions into English or German, or even Russian, a form that isn't base violence. He has a name, you know, she adds.

Napoleon Solo, you say quietly. She looks pleased with herself. You are scared of him, she says.

And you are not? He is invincible, thousands of years old, you mutter.

Invincible, yes, only to humans. We could hurt him, she smiles slyly. You look at her, shocked despite yourself. I can't hurt him. I've tried, you remind her.

She rests her chin in her hand, regarding him through half-closed eyes. I can. He burns, she says, he burns in fire and sunlight. Does he know? you ask. I'm sure he knows, she replies, he must know that he can burn, and he knows I make fire. Yet I don't think he fears me. 

You turn back to your chess game.

\--

You put down the receiver for the transmitters you'd planted in their room. You look at your hands, your skin, you stand in front of a mirror and stare at the reflectionless glass. You want to strike it, shatter the blank image of the hotel room. Instead you shudder, once, and start taking clothes out of your suitcase.

You are not surprised when he finds you, crouched by the cross-wire fence outside of the huge factory. You step aside, allowing him to free his tail from his trousers and use the razor tip to cut through the wire. He isn't embarrassed of this fifth appendage, exactly, yet there is a strange self consciousness to him as they watch his tail snick through the metal. Nicely done, you say. He glances at you, doesn't reply.

The building is shadowy, almost completely gutted on the inside. Narrow walkways wrap around the inside, and you both creep up the spindly, but mercifully quiet, staircases. You notice him use his tail to balance when you reach the walkways, something that intrigues you. Your own balance is near perfect, a boon of being one of the undead that you are grateful for.

Chains hang from the ceiling at many different heights. Most of them lead to nothing, dangling in the cavernous darkness, but some have curious, tall cages hanging from them. I don't like the look of this, you breath. A crease has appeared between his eyebrows. You reach one of the cages, and it is empty. It is made of a curious, violet metal. What is it? he asks you, his accent thick as he mutters.

I don't know, you say. He makes a noise of protest as you lurch forward, lightly stepping off the edge of the walkway and into the air, pushing yourself off and dropping down into the open door of the cage. The cage itself hardly shifts in the air with your landing. Inside the cage, attatched to the floor, are several sets of handcuffs, all made of the same metal. You realise, with a ill feeling, that two of the handcuffs are for ankles, and a larger one for the neck. That still leaves two large loops made for securing something else down. 

You'll want to see this, you say over your shoulder. The cage jerks, swinging with a sudden added weight, as he steps in, momentarily suspended over the drop into thin air. His tail curls around the bars, anchoring him in place. He regards the manacles. For people? he asks. Maybe, maybe not for humans, you reply.

You stare at each other. It is not unheard of. Those with supernatural abilities are useful, as he and yourself show. Trafficking is rare, very rare, and especially trafficking by humans, as humans can rarely overpower them. Take some of this, you say, as evidence.

Might they notice? he says, slowly. You shrug, I don't think anyone's going to check.

He has just finished cutting a length of chain from the floor, when you hear voices and see the flicker of flashlights. They found the holes in the fence, he says, tilting his head to listen to their murmurs. You curse .

\--

I have an idea, you say. He looks at you, flat blue eyes mistrustful, fangs half bared in preparation for the guards searching for them. You will have to hold onto to me, you say, and his gaze turns curious. What are you going to do? he asks, and you sigh in frustration, saying, I do not know the English word for it. 

Then, footsteps clang on the steel stairs as guards run up them, and you step forward quickly, sliding your arms around him, pulling him to your chest and whispering, close your eyes, in his ear. Before he can have a chance to react, you are disappearing, leaving a small, hardly visible haze of grey.

You hear Gaby shriek as soon as your feet touch carpet, and Napoleon sways, resting his forehead on your shoulder. You drop one arm, keep the other one up, supporting him. Gaby is standing now, behind him, barely able to say anything but, what? You say to her, We had to make a quick getaway, and I can, and you pause. 

Teleport? she asks, understanding dawning on her face. She curls her lip, batting at the sulfurous wisps of blackness wafting towards her. Why haven't you said so?

It is dangerous, you reply, tilting your head towards Napoleon. He is, you realise, unconscious, his feather-light body hardly a weight for you. Dangerous, Gaby repeats, peering around to look at Napoleon's face.

Not for me, you add, anymore. And it takes some getting used to.

You could have at least appeared in his room instead of ours, Gaby says, it wouldn't do to have you go up there now, carrying his body. 

You shake your head as you lift Napoleon up, taking him to your bed. I haven't been in his room, you say over your shoulder, and I need to have seen the place to go there. 

\--

You have never dreamed before, and indeed, you haven't slept for an eon, so when you wake, you wake with fear, your hands clawing at sheets, fangs bared. You still feel groggy, as if you'd been drugged, and if you breathed, your chest would be heaving in panic. Illya is sitting in a chair next to the bed, watching you with wary eyes as you struggle to get control over your claws and teeth. What the hell was that? you ask, pushing hair out of your face. Teleportation, he says in Gaby's accent, it makes you very tired if you are unused to it. You drop back down onto the bed. 

I don't sleep, Peril. Ever, you say, and if he reacts to the nickname, you don't see it.

Gaby has recognised the metal, he says. It is angel metal. His voice betrays no emotion, but he is several hundred lifetimes younger than you and has not seen the things you have. Angel metal. The only metal known to be unbreakable to angels. Like silver for young vampires, it brings pain to angels near it, enough to weaken them and make them tangible and compliant. This makes your mission so much more than it was. If the Vinciguerras are dealing in angels, this brings the matter to a global scale. Angels are far to volatile and powerful to be controlled without messing with the heads of those in charge. They have no allegiance to anyone, and would happily destroy countries, uncaring of the collateral damage, to free themselves. When killed, they release energy like a dying star.

**Author's Note:**

> If you need any clarification on who said what or what happened, leave a comment. Here are refs for the characters just in case:  
> Napoleon/vampire/invincible, immortal, superstrong, fangs/affected by silver, sunlight, stakes, fire  
> Illya/demon/tail, horns, superstrength, immortal, teleportation/ not invincible  
> Gaby/ifrit/control over fire, lit from inside, can raise skin temp/ affected by low temps, not invincible
> 
> talk to me at goldxfinch.tumblr.com !! i'd love to talk about fics pls pls


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